Andrew Farrell

So a few things have happened since I posted last - the big one is that I got married, but I'm going to start with a different one that I probably have less thoughts about, just to break the silence.

I cycle a lot these days, as many of you probably know. It's good solid exercise, and on my 40-minute commute there's a reasonably calm stretch (until I hit The City, basically), that I use to listen to things - a politics podcast* on the way in, and anything I want on the way home - sometime something on Youtube, though unless you pay money for it, you have to be careful that your pocket doesn't close the app or pick another video or whatever.

And twice a year (ideally), I've been doing a 100km cycle around London, spring and autumn. I hadn't done one in a while due to arm trouble, my elbow in 2017 and my shoulder last year. But I completed one in October last year, and it went well enough - it helps that by this stage I don't need the route guide at all. I had to sit back a bit more and take the weight off my arms, or my shoulder would complain a lot by then end, but it still worked, it still counted. I had at some point a plan to cycle the section from Chelsea Bridge to Hammersmith with George, over the course of a day - instead that's been remixed to walking it with Jen over the course of several days (two so far, with some more to come)

Spring and autumn are the best times to do a day cycle like that - but sometime over winter I saw a poster advertising a charity night-time cycle in early June. I signed up, and picked the 100k over the 50k version. You get a fair amount of support (including a bike service which I failed to take advantage of), including a training regimen which I thought I'd try rather than my usual tactic of just commuting every day and then - ta-da! - a 100k that kills me.

The 'try to cycle 10k several times a week' wasn't a bother - that's just my commute. It recommended a bit of strength training, which I thought I'd be in principle in favour of, except for the line "Each exercise
should include 3 sets of 10-15 repetitions (reps) so that muscle failure occurs on the last set", which reminded me why I have never been interested in big muscles.

The main part then was going out for big cycles in the weekends leading up to the event, which would take me out for a chunk of hours - mostly just adding together cycle routes I knew around the Hackney or Haringey borders. In the month before I had to do two 50k cycles, so I took the opportunity to practice the actual course - the 50k version of the event is a loop from the Velodrome in the Olympic park over to the Imperial War Museum in Lambeth and back (which handily goes by my office, where I could stash my bike the day before the practive) and the extra bits are loops out to the west and the south from the IWM.

On the day, I tried vainly to get some sleep from 5 to 9pm, and then headed out the door - at which point a bit fell off my bike that had never before fallen off. It's the bike chain guard which sits by the big gears and stops the chain leaping off the big one to its death - when I showed the mechanics at the Velodrome, they were pretty certain I wouldn't miss it, and they were right.

The route there was just on the Overground to Hackney Downs, over the connecting covered passage to Hackney Central, and then over to Hackney Wick. There's a bit of a hill entering the Olympic Park from there, nothing terrible - but we will return to this later.

( First 25k - Velodrome to Imperial War Museum )

( Second 25k - Western Chelsea Loop )

( Third 25k - Southern Crystal Palace loop )

( Final 25k - Imperial War Museum back to Velodrome )

And then the worst bit was going home - back down the hill to Hackney Wick which wouldn't open for several hours, and then up that damned hill to Stratford to get the train in to Liverpool Street, rushing off to get the 7:00 to Stamford Hill - but the first of those is at 7:30, so it wasn't until 8 before I was home and trying to sleep.

But it was done, and it was good to be done, and thanks to extraordinary generosity from friends and workmates, there's nearly a grand heading towards Mind.

* Or more accurately, Politico's UK Playbook, which has a button you can press that will play it read via Amazon Polly, which is a reasonably good automated reading service. I mean, I guess it's reasonably good, this is the only automated reading service I listen to. Its main problem, which I can't rally blame it for, is that it reads r-o-w as in "and column" not as in "a fight", and it's basically never the former in UK Politics. Also the week when the report was sponsored by an Agriscience company, which it quite reasonably read out as ag-rissence.

And after all the structured travel, Melbourne was just for dicking around. We saw a lot of Jen's friends there - Shiona took us to a noodles and a horrific hipster bar* on the 19th, and Helen to a mad scientist 'themed' cocktail bar** on the 20th. In both cases they provided what I remembered as an authentic Melbourne experience - our guide got lost trying to find our destination down the impressive back-alleys of central Melbourne.

On the Friday we had lunch with the wedding couple - it was lovely to meet them in more relaxed circumstances, and the lunch ran on a bit longer partly because the weather turned to heavy rain. We went out that night anyway - not far, just to a place that had caught Jen's eye called Hercules Morse, the name of a dog from a kid's book she used to love. It was a lovely restaurant, and we'd dressed up a bit as this was the last proper night out. Food and drink and cocktails were all excellent, and it's left a lovely memory.

I'd been feeling a little unwell over some of the holiday - the familiar pain in my left side that suggests that I've been overeating and my liver is paying the price. I'd tried not to overindulge, but it kept nagging.

We were staying in a lovely Airbnb for this last part, a converted warehouse with underfloor heating. There was an occasional ant but generally it was lovely.

Which both lead to Saturday, when the first thing we noticed on waking was a long line of ants from the bathroom across the wooden floor to a locked cupboard (or rather two lines, as there was traffic in both directions). We got the owner who cleared them out and pointed out that their source and destination wasn't as important as the fact that they were attracted to two small pools of red near the sink.

Which is the point that I realised that the lovely dilute drink that I'd been keeping myself hydrated with wasn't, as all of them are in the UK, sugar-free. Which explains both problems.

Anyway, we stayed in that evening and canoodled in front of Clash of the Titans (the newer, terrible one with Mads Mikkelsen as Rio Ferdinand) and then it was up and back to England, where someone had turned the sun down in our absence.

Cultural differences of Terra Australis:

• Top sheets - these were a thing when I was growing up in Ireland, but I've entirely done away with them since coming over here, and it was nice to be back in their genteel embrace. In the UK they seem to be not just not a thing, but not any kind of thing - in conversation with ultraruby yesterday she seemed confused about what one was (okay, I didn't help by just calling it a sheet) until she remembered that they happened in a bed herself and Iain had seen on the US roadtrip. There's an article in GQ making the case for them, I won't press it, I'll just quote "Not only do top sheets separate us from our duvets, they separate us from the animals."
  
• Shiny money - I know the UK has recently got on board, but Australia had it, with it's see-through panel, when I was there first at the turn of the millennium - and it still looks sharp.
  
• Swearing on the radio - specifically on Triple J, which is basically BBC Radio 1 with a commitment to play a lot of Australian artists (which does tend towards the 90s indie rawk, it must be said) and no language constraints of the sort that the commercial radio stations still apparently labour under: Jen noticed it on a rap track that was definitely not the radio version, I didn't cop on until "So here's Sherri, and you build shitty robots is that right? Sure do!"
  
• No tipping - I am still not convinced that being told this wasn't just the wedding couple trying to get us lynched on our last few days in the country. But we were the best tourists ever for 12 days then!

* We were admittedly one of only two tables there, but the other featured, between 8 people, two denim jackets and one appalling mustache.

** The theming was mostly just cocktail names and being able to get them in a 'syringe' or a beaker - we had regular martini glasses and thought that was the end of it - until Jen went to the loo and reported on her return that there was a hospital bed chained up Silent Hill-still next to the cubicles.

And then up on the Friday, check out and off to pick up the car. The dates had gotten a little confused back when everything was getting booked, so instead of a nice leisurely trip down and stay overnight, we were travelling the same day as the wedding. And by travelling I mean that I was in charge of driver support (sweets, tutting at the GPS), while Jen was in charge of actually driving.

We largely kept our heads down and rocked up in plenty of time - it was a small holiday resort, and the 'villas' were three-room/two-bed affairs. We found out that the person we were sharing the villa with had already turned up and taken the one key, but there was no sign of her at the locked villa. It turned out in the end that she, the bride's slightly daffy cousin, had simply set up in the villa next door, which hadn't been locked for some reason. We found that out at the wedding though, so before that I had to go back and wheedle another key out of front desk. I mention this largely because those of us who have attended ATP or similar civilised festivals will recognise the illicit thrill of having an extra key that you're not supposed to.

The wedding was on the beach, and was lovely - when we got there, the Scottish groom was standing about in his kilt, bareheaded under the sun - he apparently managed to avoid burning his head off to the amazement of many. Him and the Australian bride had met when they were both working in the same Edinburgh branch of Blackwells as Jen, about a dozen years ago. I ended up hanging around with the contingent from that shop then, Scots and another Ozzie, for the night, which as you might imagine I had no problem with.

Three sweet parts of the dinner go:

• The tables all had books instead of place settings - you were officially asked to sit where your heart takes you, but swapping around to sit where you wanted was also expected. I ended up in front of Muriel Barbery's The Elegance of the Hedgehog - less because it did mean anything to me than because a table of booksellers advised me it was great (and of course we got to take the books home with us)
  
• There was a projector up, after from a video message from the best man it spent most of the night cycling through photos of the couple over the last 12 years, mugging for the camera in various different holidays around the world. Apart from anything else it was good for me as a stranger to appreciate the groom's many facial hair choices as context for the soul patch he currently sports.
  
• Just before and to the side of the main dining area, a small table displaying the various cultural offerings of the two countries: Tunnocks Tea Cakes/Caramel bars, Irn Bru and Tablet on one side, Timtams, Liquorice Bullets and Jaffas on the other.
  
• Bonus extra sweet thing - the bride had rented out a photo booth and a table full of prop hats - you'll see the four we took in time, I promise.

The next day was very quiet as expected - there was the aforementioned barbecue sprawling over most of the afternoon, then we went for a wander around the rocks on the eastern end of the beach - around on the furthest point there was a patch where massive waves would roll up, the blazing sun and the colour of the ocean meant that the vertical sides of the waves shone the most perfect turquoise. We wandered back along the beach, had a meal later, and went out for another nighttime beach stroll, seeing the bright clear unfamiliar stars. It was about this point, a week in, that the trip tipped over to "this is bliss".

The first day didn't start great - I'd caught the very start of some form of head cold on the plane and that combined with the jetlag to make me pretty punchdrunk.

We rose late and wandered the area we were staying (King's Cross, as seedy as its London namesake), then up northwards towards Mrs Macquarie's point. It's a noted place for a view of Sydney, but the to be honest it's not difficult to get good views on a good day (which it was) from any approach. We wandered through the Royal Botanical Gardens, home of many excellent trees (including an amazing array of different palms) and over to the Opera House, which was hosting a festival of First Nations art. We got to see some of the traditional dance competition, but I was fading fast. Home then, via a local Thai takeaway.

The night wasn't a lot of fun - between the cold coming on, my lower back (which has been giving me a bit more trouble recently), my shoulder (which has been on and off sore since I fell off my bike - which I've done twice since my last non-holiday update, remind me to tell you about it sometime) and the jet lag, it was a carnival of grim. About 4am I Googled the NHS exercises for lower back pain, and grunted my way through them on the floor of the hotel room, phone just out of sight of Jen's attempts to sleep herself. It did a little good and then I got back to bed - obviously the catch 22 is that sleep would have helped with any of them but they combined (together with a Jen that was both jet lagged and trapped in a bed with this horror show) to fend off sleep.

And so a slow start to the day, which was bizarrely warm for the trip, 10 degrees hotter than either side. We hid inside until way past midday then headed into Sydney Central and walked over to Darling Harbour to see the Aquarium, on the basis that if you have to be out, surround yourself with as much water as possible.

You'd probably guess that Sydney Aquarium would be good, and you'd be entirely right - squid and sharks and dugong and jellyfish and mantas and blue tang / clownfish or, as they are officially known now to pre-teens, Dories and Nemos.

We got the ferry back around to Circular Quay, to new views of the Opera House and the bridge, but my clock was ticking down, so while Jen went to a restaurant for pizza, I headed home to get a head start on a night's sleep.

Hiya folks,

I have the same views as mostly everyone you know about the current state of the world - the last week's been largely been a nightmare on that front, comedy Macbeth from the Tories aside. The options are disaster now or disaster later, hate crimes are on the rise, the Labour party is engaging in startlingly ill-timed convulsions that can't end anywhere good, and a cloud is spreading over pretty much everywhere.

So, here's some stuff I've been doing to distract myself:


Hanging out with Jen has been been a regular thing for a while now of course, but we're in the middle of an interesting week - her parents came into London last week (having come down from Perth to babysit her niblings in Kent while her brother and his wife went off on holiday) and we went out for a meal, and to meet each other for the first time. And this evening I'm getting a train to Gatwick (okay, two trains as the direct one has been cancelled), meeting her there, and then we're to Dublin to meet my sister Brenda and her partner, and on to Navan tomorrow to meet Josephine, her family, and Mum. I'll be a little calmer once the weekend's over, for sure. But I'm a little calmer around her anyway. We've been hit differently by Brexit - her post-doc is paid-up for the next two and a half years, but everything after that is ????, whereas I'm securely paid in a company that may just fade away if the word "passporting" appears in future EU-UK negotiations. Plan C (or D) is "go to Edinburgh, wait a few years, maybe don't even leave the EU" - it's a big step but these look like big times. The weekend will be the first time we've shared a bed two days in a row - all practice for the Big Trip this October, a wedding of a friend of hers which we'll expand to a Sydney->Melbourne road trip.


And then on Sunday, we had some time to spare, so we went on a trip, by train to London Fields and on by bus to the area between the Isle of Dogs and the Excel centre, where the roads belie the original use of the land (Oregano Drive! Saffron Avenue! Nutmeg Lane! Clove Crescent! All just south of East India Dock Road). There's a lump of land there, where the final contortions of the River Lea (now containing the souldead 'New Manhattan', London City Island) meet the Thames. And on that lump is London's only (ex-training) Lighthouse, and a lot of art, and several buildings made of shipping containers.

And up in that lighthouse, is Longplayer, a music experience intended to run for 1000 years. It's a 20-minute piece by Jem Finer, played on Tibetan Singing Bowls, and a series of rules on how to modulate the piece which will guarantee it doesn't repeat over the duration. It's a little conceptual - it can be played anywhere, there are computers you can listen to it on, you can probably find out "what will be playing on 21st May 2135" - but it's also a lovely soothing sound.

The sound is best heard in the listening gallery, which is a small room at the top of the lighthouse (where the bulb would have been), with two nice chairs in it. And so we sat there for a bit, and took it in. The view is interesting - the cable-car over the Thames to the left, the Dome in the centre, Canary Wharf etc to the right - all potent signifiers of evil if you're that way inclined. But also all part of London by now, drawn into the city. I spent some time just watching a cable car crawl up and across the river, which with the chiming score reminded me of Koyaanisqatsi, which we'd tried to watch a few weeks before (but you need to be in the right mood). There was a sky with every different type of cloud in it, and the occasional roar of a jet overhead, and I felt something profound but (as you can tell) difficult to communicate.



And then on Monday, the mighty Karaoke Circus made a return. I wrote a little while ago about the revival of this live-band night of Karaoke for comedians and punters, which had been brought back specifically to mark the death of David Bowie. They unwisely ended that one with "See you all when Prince dies" - so here we were.

I was a little concerned - David Bowie has a lot of songs that are a good singalong, while Prince's stuff is frankly fiddly - but all involved did well (except the girl whose schtick was being terrible and screechy). Two of my friends got up - toriar for Little Red Corvette and operacat for Starfish and Coffee. The comedians did okay, a certain amount of over-egging is probably understandable under the circumstances (though I'd have felt better about it if there was a single non-white person on stage apart from possibly the violin player who came on for two songs) - the surprise was "Tall Prince" aka Tim effing Vine, who did a perfect rendition of Sign of the Times, sans lyrics sheets, while dressed as a slightly-modded Elvis. The modification was adding a third lens to a pair of purple sunglasses, in the style of Twitter Prince, and worked quite well.

And then there was Lisa, who apparently walked up during the first interval and asked to sing, who may well have been there by herself (she had to park her backpack on the stage), and who nailed Kiss. I don't think there was anything exceptional about her voice (though I'm no expert), but she rode the rails of the song expertly and brought us with her. And then when she was acclaimed as the (punter-only) winner, she was just as suited to Purple Rain, which was inevitable as the last, sing-along, track. I like the idea that she had a train on to Amsterdam later on, a great and implausible story to take with her.

My washer/dryer has been off its food for a while - the fabric softener hasn't been lessening with each load. The tray that is the only easily-removable part of the machine has bent a little, and there's a knack for getting it back in, so I've spent some time foostering at that, wondering if the bend is creating a seal (or breaking one?) that is stopping the water getting at the lovely softener. It's not the settings, as I never change the settings.

And without softener, my clothes have been getting harder, sometimes transforming t-shirts into canvas - it's not good, and so I've been carrying around the same "Maybe it'll get better" / "I know that it won't" feeling that I had for the pain in my side a few years ago.

Today, though, I got to the clothes just as they were ready to be taken out, and realised that something was very wrong - the clothes were actually painfully hot to the touch, some of the plastic buttons had melted on the duvet cover (one which is due to be replaced soon, though), and I actually burned my hand a bit touching the inside of the drum.

A quick Google of 'Indesit washer dryer too hot' indicates that they have in fact been bursting into flames, and a link to a page which will tell you if yours is due for the recall / repair. The waiting period is expected to be March at this rate, the link warns - but my make isn't apparently affected?

Anyway, I ring the number, confirm that I'm not in warantee (There's a sticker on it for 'Ring to start your 5 years spare parts guarantee' - it would probably be a bit cheeky to try to start that now rather than five and a half years ago). They put me through to someone, we start to discuss when it would be possible for someone to come out, and then I start swearing, including calling myself a fucking muppet, on the phone to a stranger.

The machine has a dial on the right, with all the possible things you can do on there, and in the centre of that dial is the knob you turn it round by - it's symmetrical but there's a little raised bit with a smudge by it.

Except what I've just spotted, on the phone to the support organiser, is that the smudge isn't on that side, it's on the other side, and the machine's not set to the regular wash and dry, but to 'Dry (Cotton)'. For the last few weeks, I haven't actually been washing my clothes at all - I've just been really really really drying them.

I freely admit that I wasted my first trip to New York - not entirely of course, I saw George's friends Daniel and Zeke, and I saw cartographer , all of whom were great.

Also I went out to an evening called Women of Letters, which is where they ask several female writers to write a letter on a certain theme.

Five of the writers were (from the Facebook blurb):

• Acclaimed playwright and screenwriter of Academy Award-nominated 'Beasts of the Southern Wild' LUCY ALIBAR
  
• Acclaimed rapper and 'Sisterhood of Hip Hop' star NYEMIAH SUPREME
  
• Writer, former dominiatrix and author of 'Whip Smart' MELISSA FEBOS
  
• Beloved actress/comedian, vlogger and host of MTV's Decoded FRANCHESCA RAMSEY
  
• Moth-champion storyteller, comedian and writer MEG FERRILL

And I felt bad for all of them (particularly Melissa Febos, who was fantastic) because the sixth was Mallory Ortberg. She totally cheated on the theme ("Letters to my could have been"), but told an amazing story of an informational interview she had when she was in New York a decade ago. You will probably not be surprised to hear that her flat delivery was flawless.



In Philadelphia I mostly hung out with sinsense - I amused myself during the days by firstly walking around town finding a new pair of socks/underwear/t-shirt (because I'd miscounted what I'd brought over vs my access to a washing machine), and then secondly by limping not very far because I'd knackered a tendon near my ankle. But the evening was spent hanging about with her, which (sorry, Philly) was basically what I came to town for. I was introduced to the Bourne Ultimatum, she was introduced to Father Ted, we both spoiled ourselves for a crucial and controversial episode of Ru Paul's Drag Race (to the annoyance of her boy).



I got more done the second time in New York - mostly Art because why not Art?

The Japan Society had an exhibition of Experimental Japanese Photography of 1960-1970, which frankly 50 years has not done any favours to - "We can still take photos of buildings, but they can be shaky now to indicate the tremors tearing their way through society!" "I can take a camera on honeymoon with my wife, and we can move from formal looks to the more intimate relationship that thrives away from the public persona. Now, get your tits out, love. No, I'll stay fully dressed, thanks"

The MoMa PS1 has the triennial Greater NY exhibition, 60 current artists' work, a lot I enjoyed and one that I LOVED - a video of the work and craft that goes into making the horrific gewgaws that get passed out at the completion of big business deals - some of it available on the artist's site: http://www.benthorpbrown.com/Speculative-Presence

The Marian Goodman gallery has two shows: big photos from Jeff Wall of people in various stances of 'unreadable' and an amazing room wallpapered with the design drawings for the opera Lulu, currently on at the Met. Big bold blacks on newspaper (actually dictionaries!) expertly sketching people and completely covering the available area.

I missed the gallery the first time around, as it's in the Gallery Building, containing a bunch of them crammed in on different floors - I ended up walking around the block and was directed to the internal elevator by some of the gentlemen that carry stuff about. When I had to ask for directions to the Jeff Wall from the drawings, the NY Art Receptionist said "Oh, did you come up through there? Unusual." which added a spring to my step for the rest of the day.

And finally the Morgan Library was showing two exhibitions recommended by Anthony - Martin Puyeur is a sculptor but the show is of his drawings - but past sketches from his early life, they are mostly of his sculptures, several of which are also present (some in miniature). And there's an excellent exhibition about Matisse's history of illustration for books, including one which was nixed by the publisher after it became clear that he'd never actually read the book - the author was completely in favour, but then it was Ulysses.



And then the last three days were spent in Canada - my friend Katharine has a house not too far from Brock University where she teaches, and as with the last time I made this trip 6 years ago, I largely spent it reading and eating and napping and generally relaxing - the night of the Friday aside, of course. And on Saturday I headed over a little further around Lake Ontario to Hamilton, where I met Anthony and hung around with him for a few hours, seeing his newish life there, visiting a waterfall, eating a Butter Tart. And then home, and seeing that Clovember has returned several of you (incl. sinsense!) to LJ, and good thing too.


Also last night the Planetary Scientist, who had been back home in Scotland for the last week of my trip, came back and came around. After a while we fell to talking, and while I was gone she got notification that she has both a proper post-doc next April in London, and some sort of bridging money until it starts, which she can use to stay down here and write up her corrections. And after a while we fell to talking again, and now I have a girlfriend! Her name's Jen.

I only thought to check during the week (I thought it was later in the month), but Thursday gone is five years since I got the keys for 22 Heysham Road - I still have on my phone the photo of them that I send to George. I have plans for it over the next while, though so far it's just been furniture moving - the bureau over here, that bookshelf out into the dining room, swap the couch and the desk. But it's edging on for halfway into the year, and I should probably get on with that.

My cycle home leads me down the West Bank, a side of a non-descript railway that was presumably named that before Stamford Hill became a centre for Hasidic Judaism. There's two removal vehicles (the type you would use to take away cars) usually parked on that street, and even odder two cars permanently up on the stirrups that protrude from the back of the vehicles. My only explanation is that perhaps, in order to encourage correct handling of these unwieldy monsters, the drivers are encouraged to drive their own cars home like this.

I was watching a trailer recently - I do this a lot, I seek out at least 10 trailers of films I never end up seeing for every one I do - where Jason Segel, of variously varieties of 'lovable' man-child (and also the Muppet Movie) plays a genius writer who is being joined by Jesse Eisenberg, as a nervous journalist and aspiring writer who's travelling with him on his book tour to write an article about travelling with him on his book tour. It seems pretty terrible, Segel at one point says "I think if the book is about anything, it is about the question of 'Why?' - Why am I doing it and what's so American about what I'm doing?" - and it completely doesn't earn the spark that it get when REM's Strange Currencies screams and shimmies in about halfway through. But it did remind me to go listen to the song a half-dozen times, so thanks, I guess..

Except on rewatching the trailer, I realised that I'd missed that this was based on a true story, and Segel's character is actually David Foster Wallace, touring Infinite Jest. I don't honestly know how I feel about this - I've never read a word of his work as far as I know, but I've had a lot of people tell me that I'd like it. Here's the trailer, and any thoughts or recommendations on DFW are welcome. I assume that unlike Pynchon, the test is just to dive into his most famous work, Infinite Jest.

I see this every day, I might as well get a post out of it.

When I cycle to work, I travel over London Bridge as all Londoners must by law - you can see the river on the north of the map here. I get to the south end of the bridge, and then head left (east) down Duke St Hill, which rolls gently down towards work. You can see a tree just a little down the hill, and there's a traffic crossing next to it at the top of the hill - particularly in the morning, passengers pour forth from the many exits of London Bridge Station and swell on the little peninsula just to the south.

There's also, as you can see, a lot of buses on the bridge, clogging the lanes up and slowing things down to their speed, and so I'm nearly always waiting at the traffic lights at the end of the bridge, while the traffic flows west up the hill and on north / south as it will. And then the lights change there, and the buses head into the station, south of that peninsula, and the bikes head down Duke Street Hill - except that the pedestrians have spotted that while their light is red, the light for traffic coming up the hill has just switched from green to red, so they pour over the road, unaware that the approaching bikes have a green light, becaue you know what bikes are like, right?

I think it's a very English situation, and indeed a very London one - no attention paid to the red lights by the commuters, but nothing more than scathing glares from them when the bikes try to get through a green light (there's something stronger than glares generally coming from the bikes. Well, from mine, anyway).

ANYWAY, that's my commute frustration - what's yours?